RGB colors Preview Vs. Pixels

[Box on Rails]

If this has been shared here before sorry for the repost but this is a helpful tip that I found out myself. I've been using LOR software and Hardware for 12 years and This is going to be my first year with all RGB Pixels. I am redoing All of my previous sequence and adding some new ones. I am also adding a number of new props. I have been testing all the new props as I complete them and once they pass testing, They go into storage. What I wanted to share here with People is the fact that when sequencing, the colors you see on the preview might match what the pixels actually displays. Of course the 100% red, green, blue and white display as intended, The trick is in the blended colors. The best example is when I choose the Orange in the color palette for my pumpkins. It looks really orange in the preview but when I play the pumpkin prop it displays a red.  The tip here is to have a back up set of pixel to test colors. I stared doing this back in January when I first started building a lot of Pumpkins for my Halloween show. Use these pixels to find the right mix and document the blend of colors. what I do is create an animation sequence with one pixel string prop. the assign the controller I am using and start adding colors to the sequence. then play the sequence and see how they look. try doing pink. it probably won't be pink at the pixels so start adjusting the colors until you find it. then document the color settings. There is no brown so don't even got here. Hope this helps. This video explains why brown is elusive. 

 

[TheDucks]

Alex is getting plugs from all fronts 👍  (he also got a recent plug from Transport Evolved (A tuber on EV tech. Yes I drive a LEAF))

[k6ccc]

Not only will real pixels usually look different on screen vs on the real pixels, they will also look different pixels and even different batches of the same pixels - that's why you always want to buy spares when you buy pixels (and label the box so you know which spares go with which prop).  To make it even worse, they will look different depending on the background.  This part is more important when the pixels will be lighting up that background as opposed to freestanding in the yard - for example pixels that are around a window frame as opposed to a free standing arch.  My standard advise is to test pixels and adjust the colors to get the color you want on the actual pixels with them mounted where they will be used.

What I do is take a laptop out into the front yard at night and either cable into whatever network is needed or remote into my show computer.  Then use the pixel console in the Hardware Utility to tweek the colors while you are watching until you get the desired color.  Document your findings for future use.  With some colors, the required adjustments are very small.  For example with some pixel, to get the right Orange, it may take 100% Red and 11% Green - and neither 10% nor 12% will look right.  As Box said, Orange is hard and Brown even harder to get it to look good.

 

[Box on Rails]

19 hours ago, TheDucks said:

Alex is getting plugs from all fronts 👍  (he also got a recent plug from Transport Evolved (A tuber on EV tech. Yes I drive a LEAF))

I found Him a couple years ago in my feed. I was searching YouTube for a video on how to make Brown in RGB and this was in the top of the search results. Once I watched I was hooked. He has a lot of really interesting videos on both his channels.